In term 4 Primary 5 at Chapelside Primary School in Airdrie had the opportunity to borrow a set of 10 Dsi’s. The children were extremely excited about this familiar piece of equipment in their classroom. Only a few of the children had never used a DSi so initial instuctions in the use of the equipment was very quick and the more experienced users in the class were able to support the novices in getting to grips with this.
The children used the DSi during their everyday numeracy sessions in class. The children were shocked to discover that they were working with a brain age on average of 80 years old.
They were very keen to improve on this and an element of competition in doing so kept the children engaged as they battled to improve their own and at the same time beat their classmates ‘brain age’.
The main aim of using the DSi in our primary 5 classroom was to support the children in developing mental agility in order to assist and improve their work in numeracy. The nature of the games in the brain training programme helped the children to do this. This was esepecially evident during quick fire multiplication, addition or subtraction games used in whole class or group situations. I was very pleased to see that many of the children were answering the questions quicker and with more ease and believe this is linked to the use of the games in the brain training programme.
I would highly reccommend the use of DSis in the classroom in order to support and develop mental agility and to engage the children’s interest through the use of technology in the classroom.
The DS were used with pupils during the final term to develop mental mathematics skills in a variety of context.
Pupils used the DS Nintendo daily for 20 minutes and chose the activities which they felt would help develop their mathematics skills. It gave the pupils’ choice and increased their motivation.
Pupils were keen to improve their brain age and to try and beat the teacher as I also took part in the project.
One of the pupils who receives learning support was pleased when he received a stamp and this motivated him.
DS Nintendo Pupil Comments.
I liked the interactive way that the Nintendo taught us. It was amazing how we could learn and play at the same time. It was
just fantastic. Samantha
When I was playing the DS Nintendo I liked to get good scores. I t was fun to play the different games. I liked Head count. It was hard but I enjoyed the challenge. Jamie
I liked playing the DS Nintendo because every time that you worked hard your brain age improved. David
I really enjoyed using the Ds Nintendo. I think that it helped me become quicker at answering times tables, adding, taking away and dividing. I think that it really improved these skills. Ben
I enjoyed using the Ds because it was great fun and as you were playing games you were learning. Daniel
I enjoyed the Brain training as I like doing maths. It was very puzzling and I like solving the problems. It has improved my brain. Chloe
We borrowed a set of 10 DSI’s with Braintraining from the lending service.
They were initially used as an incentive during Golden Time and as part of the mental maths programme.
After reading the feedback from Thornlie Primary on the blog we followed their model of taking a base brain age for each child and completing training everyday. We would then check our brain age once a week.
The children enjoyed charting their progress each week and comparing their progress with friends.
As a class teacher I found them to be a great motivator and a super way to engage all learners.
The children in my class enjoyed using the Dsi, They became very competitive with each other and it was a good way for all the children to interact with each other in a way that they could not before. The children were very keen and enthusiastic when using the Dsi. My only challenge was in a class of 33 i had to split the children into groups and they were allocated a day in the week were it was their turn to use the dsi. Other than this, it was an excellent experience for the children.
Our Primary 7/6 had the opportunity to have the use of 10 DSi’s with Braintraining from the Loan Service.
To start with we numbered them and allocated them one between two children. After taking a base ‘Brain Age’ the children were given the opportunity to use them on a daily basis at specific time to play the Brain Training Games. Every Wednesday each child recorded an updated Brain Age. These were recorded on a wall chart and progress was tracked.
At the end of our time using them the child who had improved their brain age the most won a small prize and got a ‘Best Brain” certificate.
At other times of the day the children were allowed to use the DSi’s to create animations, use the photo facility and ‘chat’ to friends.
The children found the DSi’s to be very motivational. They were amazed that their teacher encouraged them to play on the DSi.
Here are some of the comments from the children in the class.
The DSi’s are so much fun. The stuff in it is challenging and really makes you think hard and fast.
The thing I liked best about having the DSi’s is that you think your playing but your really learning.
I liked it best when you got your new Brain Age and you could see how you were getting better.
The thing I enjoyed the most was the maths tasks. They were quite tricky but you can amaze yourself at how well you do.
It’s sad that the DSi’s have to go back. Maths’s time hast been the best since we’ve had them.
Here are the comments of some of our Primary 6 class in St Brigid’s Primary in Newmains on their experiences with the DSi.
It has been an honour to use the DSi. They have helped me in my maths, reading and remembering words. It was very extraordinary to use the DSi because when you’re using it you don’t even know you’re learning because it’s such fun! I would love to have them again but for longer.
I really enjoyed the DSi, it has been an honour having them in our classroom. I had so much fun that I didn’t realise that I was learning. It has helped me with my maths and memory. It also helped us understand I.C.T. and demonstrate my progress. It is really challenging and it feels like a competition. I wish we had more time.
It was a honour using the DSi it helped us with our maths and our education. It was so much fun I didn’t even know I was learning it even helped me with I.C.T I really like using the DSi I wish they could stay.
What is great about the DSi? The DSi is amazing because you can learn and have fun at the same time. On Brain Training I really liked 20x calculation. I will miss you.:(
Over the past few weeks we have been using the DSi and it has been helping us with our spelling, maths, and memory. It was fun too and we didn’t even know that we are learning! It helps us with our times tables and it is a great way because we are trying to beat our brain age and it gets competitive. There was more than one game, my favourite was head count and I also like low to high.
I love DSI !!! Not only are they bags of fun these DSI help us with our schoolwork. The DSI has helped us understand ICT. We would have liked to have used the World Wide Web on them. It helped us with our maths, it demonstrated our progress. Everyone wanted to be the youngest so it made everyone work harder.
For the past few weeks we have had great fun with the DSI. They taught us lots of things and helped us with all our maths and mostly helped us with our tables. Most of the time we didn’t even realise we were learning anything. Every time we brain train we get less brain age because we get better and better at it.
For the last few weeks we have been using the DSi, and it has been a great experience. The DSi has been helping us understand I.C.T, they have also helped us with our maths they are brilliant. They are a fun way to learn interactively, and one of the weirdest things is that we have had so much fun we haven’t realised we have been learning. I really enjoyed using the DSi!!
Over the past few weeks we have been using the DSi from North Lanarkshire’s I.C.T base. The DSi helped most of our class with our maths, it also showed us what we had to work on. It is a fun and interactive way to learn. We would also like to access the web with the DSi. We really enjoyed using the DSi and we hope to use them again and experience more.
Over the past few months we have been using the DSI from North Lanarkshire Council. They have been helping us to learn our maths better. The DSI is a fun way to learn it also helps us to try harder to get the smallest brain age. When we went on the DSI we did not even know we were learning. I cannot believe that my brain age to start with was 80 and now it is 40. I loved to learn with the DSI and I am sad that they have to go back.
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